Not everyone in college likes to drink. In fact, for the majority of our freshman year, one of my roommates refused to go to parties because she doesn’t like the taste of alcohol. Unfortunately, she didn’t immediately tell me this. For the first couple weeks of school, she would find excuses not to come out. For example, come Friday or Saturday night, she had a paper to write or a TV show that she just had to watch.

After about two months of coming back to find that she hadn’t even started the paper or that she hadn’t even watched the show, I realized that there was another reason. When I asked her about it, she admitted that she simply couldn’t bring herself to drink, and she did not want to be the odd one out at parties.

About three weeks before school ended, my friend finally decided that she was going to come to a party with the rest of us roomies. And you know what, she had more fun than we did! Plus, she actually remembered the details of our enjoyable outing (she could recount in detail how we made complete fools of ourselves the following morning).

As a matter of fact, my roommate had such a good time that she came along to every party that we attended for the rest of the year, wishing that she hadn’t wasted so many nights back at the dorm doing nothing.

Now, I’m not saying that parties are the only way to have a good time on the weekends. However, if you do want to go out to parties with your friends but fear that you will be considered a social pariah if you don’t drink, here is some helpful advice: Read More »

Alright, what the hell, you’re in this four-hundred person lecture and just your luck, you can’t spot a single familiar face. Now what?

Spend the rest of the semester in studying solitude? Stalk a TA to answer all your simple assignment questions? Maybe you’ll just skip every class and hope your professor puts the notes online.OR, you could grow some balls and MAKE some friends. Doesn’t class go by a lot quicker when there’s someone you can pass notes to during?

It does, trust me.

So sure, it’s a little intimidating when there’s more people in your Philosophy lecture hall than there were in your graduating senior class of high school, but don’t worry, a bunch of the kids around you are looking for someone to strike up a conversation with as well. It’s really quite easy:

Ask questions.
From ‘Do you have any idea what Professor Sherman is talking about?’ to something as simple as, ‘Can I borrow a pen?’. Simply asking a question can kickstart a classroom friendship made in heaven. How else are you going to make study groups and pass the class? Or even better, get an invite to that kickass Men’s Soccer party this Saturday. Read More »